Catch up on the latest political news from across Kent with Rob Bailey, joined by Clive English, the Liberal Democrat opposition leader at Maidstone Borough Council, and Swale Conservative Mike Whiting.
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00:00 Welcome to the Kemp Politics Show live on KMTV. I'm Rob Bailey. And this week we've
00:28 seen stories about spears being removed from the jungle and statues being removed from
00:32 Greek temples. Later we'll talk about what the Parthenon Marbles debate might mean for
00:37 Kent's museums. But first, to the jungle, or more accurately, an ancient woodland just
00:42 outside Maidstone. KCC is considering ripping up oaken wood to expand a quarry at Hermitage
00:48 Lane. It would create up to 190 jobs and produce materials for road building. But at what cost?
00:55 Here with me is Clive English, the Lib Dem opposition leader at Maidstone Council, and
00:59 swale Conservative Mike Whiting. Welcome tonight. Clive, this was a special meeting on Wednesday
01:06 at Maidstone Council where there was some quite strong language used about this wood,
01:09 a site of national importance that could determine the future of ancient woodland across the
01:14 UK. Tell us a bit more about that. Well, legally, ancient woodland has some of the most important
01:21 protections within the national planning policy framework. And if you want to rip it up, you
01:26 have to show that there is an exceptional need and that would override the planning
01:33 policy considerations. There are two issues with this. One is the importance of the woodland
01:39 itself. And secondly, many councillors, myself included, with planning experience, are concerned
01:45 that Maidstone Council has not, in our representations, weighed the evidence properly and has not
01:53 set forth why this should be an exception. So that would open the floodgates, to mix
02:00 metaphors, to development in all other ancient woodlands. If it is to be developed, there
02:06 must be a clear reason set out why this is an exception that merits going away from national
02:13 planning policy. And so far, that's not been done. And don't forget, once you rip up an
02:18 ancient woodland, you can't, contrary to what some people will say, replace it. Right, this
02:23 is Kent County Council, is the one that's come forward with these proposals. Is it right
02:28 to be looking at taking ancient woodland for quarrying in this way? We have to, of course,
02:34 Clive is right. Ancient woodlands are called that because that's what they are and they
02:38 can't just regrow back in any way. So they do have to be protected and rightly they are
02:44 protected to a very large extent. Equally, we have to balance the needs of the community
02:52 and here in Kent. And it's right also that Kent has a robust plan for being able to provide
02:57 the minerals that we need within the county to build roads, to build homes and build stuff
03:05 that needs building without importing it from elsewhere. So the Kent Minerals Plan, for
03:10 example, would outline those areas where we have minerals underneath our soil here in
03:17 Kent that we can use to our advantage. So it will always be then a weighing up game.
03:22 But I think Clive is right. I think there has to be extraordinarily solid reasons why
03:27 we would want to move away and allow the woodland to be used in this way. And we can argue about
03:36 whether those reasons have been properly explained. I can tell you one reason because this came
03:41 from a call for sites, which is essentially a survey, a kind of appeal that Kent County
03:45 Council make saying where can we do this kind of quarrying to fulfil our needs? And the
03:50 last time that happened, only one site was put forward. That was this site. KCC is now
03:55 saying it's going to make a new call for sites. But what makes us think that we're going to
03:58 get any more coming forward this time? Well, it's always the same. It's the same with the
04:03 local plan. Maidstone Borough Council's local plan will include areas that have come forward
04:08 in a call for sites for house building or for industrial development. So you're always
04:14 relying on landowners simply coming forward and saying, actually, my piece of land is
04:19 available should you need it. And then the decisions are taken as to what. So I think
04:23 it's right to go out for walk-alls. Nothing's set in stone, but please pardon the pun, because
04:29 it's not really a laughing matter. It's a very serious matter, particularly for those
04:34 who like I do. And I know Clive does cherish these ancient woodlands, which make up the
04:40 kind of fabric of Kent, in my view. There's a possibility, though, Clive, isn't there,
04:43 that one site will come back again? That will be this site. And that puts this wood essentially
04:48 at the front line of the battle between growth and the environment. I think, yes, but we
04:54 need to make sure that that's considered properly. And certainly in our response, Maidstone Borough
04:58 Council has not considered it properly. The council has not weighed the relevant factors.
05:03 They've just given unequivocal support, which is not appropriate to a decision of this magnitude.
05:10 Secondly, there is an argument that there is a need for conservation materials, particularly
05:16 ragstone, for built development. There is still considerable debate whether there is
05:21 actually a strategic need for the road building material. So I think that needs to be taken
05:27 into account, whether actually road building material, unlike the conservation aspect,
05:33 can be sourced from other materials. And I would not want to sit here in the studio and
05:39 give you a technical answer to that. But I think we need to be absolutely certain that
05:43 if we touch this woodland, we have to touch the woodland, because we are not going to
05:47 be able to go back and change our minds. But that leaves open the possibility that we could
05:51 touch it. So are you saying no under any circumstances, or are you saying that this woodland under
05:55 some circumstances could be quarried? I think it's a planning issue. Like all planning issues,
06:02 you have to weigh the evidence. And you shouldn't necessarily predetermine what that should
06:07 be. The county council planning committee will need to make a... well, the policy committees
06:13 will need to make a determination first, and then the planning application. As far as the
06:20 evidence I've seen so far suggests, it would strongly indicate that we should not be doing
06:25 this development. But, as I said, there is a lot of work that Maitland Council officers,
06:32 planning officers, and the county council have simply not done. And until that's done,
06:37 you can't be 100% certain. But my view is that all the evidence strongly suggests that
06:41 we should not be doing this. It's interesting, obviously we are talking about planning, and
06:45 it does get very technical and complicated. But this was a big part of what the government
06:49 put forward in its autumn statement last week. Something that I haven't talked about that
06:52 much in our analysis of that last week was big reforms of planning. And part of that
06:56 was incentives to make big decisions quicker. If councils take their time, if they delay
07:02 too long, they'll be unable to claim back the fees that they incur through the planning
07:07 process, which could be quite a significant financial penalty for councils. Is that going
07:11 to put pressure on Kent County Council, Maidstone Council, to make fast decisions rather than
07:15 necessarily right decisions? I think you can make fast and correct decisions. And I think
07:22 the planning process is very prolonged. And rightly so for really big developments, and
07:29 I would include the Oak and Wood thing as a big development if it were to happen. And
07:36 it's right that time is taken. But so often, some of the much smaller developments are
07:42 taking months, if not years, to go through the planning process. And that does have an
07:48 effect on how quickly we can get the homes we need, including the affordable homes, how
07:53 quickly we can get some of the other things that come with those homes, be they schools
07:57 or doctor's surgeries or whatever they may be, and new roads. So speeding up, and I think
08:04 the only way sometimes you can use carrots, occasionally you have to use a stick.
08:08 Quite. I mean, Maidstone has seen some really big applications over the years. I was a reporter
08:13 in Maidstone when the Kent International Gateway was proposed, for example. Are you worried
08:17 about the kind of pressure that you might be put under to make decisions fast in circumstances
08:22 like that? Well, when you make fast decisions, you can often make wrong ones. I would say
08:28 that the government has talked a lot, and previous governments have talked a lot about
08:32 making the planning system faster, but most reforms so far, including the National Planning
08:37 Policy Framework and the new local plan structure, have made them slower. Because what tends
08:42 to happen is that there have been a more and more complicated system developed in the name
08:48 of making it faster, and it has become quite bizarre. What is actually needed to bring
08:53 forward development as opposed to planning applications is a system where if developers
08:59 don't build the application out within a certain period of time, they lose the consent. That's
09:05 what's needed as a fundamental reform. It's all very well getting planning applications,
09:10 but it's actually getting them built out that is the problem. The government wants to reduce
09:15 house prices, but developers shouldn't be able to land bank until the price goes up.
09:21 Yeah, and I think Clive's right on that, because I heard an estimate the other day there's
09:25 a million homes that have got planning permission in the UK, but are simply not being built
09:30 out. It's too expensive to build them at the moment. At the moment it is very expensive
09:34 to build out, and we'll probably come to that when we talk about building leisure centres
09:37 later. But it's very expensive to build out at the moment, and we know that. But at the
09:43 same time, there is a massive demand, particularly for affordable homes, and we need to start
09:48 getting some of those homes out the ground. It was a neat segue there, because that was
09:51 the other thing that was discussed by Maidstone Council this week. Maidstone Leisure Centre
09:55 is 53 years old, some say in desperate need of a refresh, but that's been estimated at
10:01 a cost of around £60 million. Local councils don't have an awful lot of money these days.
10:06 Is there a risk to the future of leisure services in places like those?
10:09 Well, we will have to either extend the life of the leisure centre or replace it. The reason
10:18 Maidstone Council didn't want to come down on a firm timetable at the meeting on Wednesday
10:22 was very simple. If I can go back to what Mike just said, very correctly said about
10:28 affordable housing, Maidstone Council cross-party has set an ambitious target for 1,000 affordable
10:34 homes. That's an expensive programme, but one we need to do because we have a massive
10:40 overspend on temporary accommodation for the homeless, £970,000 in our current budget.
10:46 That's many councils across the country.
10:49 So that must be the absolute priority. So we don't know exactly how much it's going
10:56 to cost and the details of that programme. We hope to have that much more clearly delineated
11:03 in the near future. Once we have that absolutely vital programme nailed down, we will know
11:09 whether we are going to have to do a temporary refresh of the leisure centre or whether we
11:15 will have enough headroom to actually...
11:17 We have a very small amount of time left, but in the meantime...
11:19 Enough headroom to build a new one.
11:20 A million pounds a year extra on maintenance of that centre in the meantime. Is that good
11:24 use of public money?
11:27 We have to take into account that borrowing costs are very, very high at the moment. So
11:32 although it sounds very, very poor use of public money, it may well be that the worst
11:39 use of public money would be to borrow now when interest rates are probably at their
11:44 peak.
11:44 Time for a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about Kent school teachers who
11:47 refuse to work because they don't feel safe. Stay with us.
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